100 Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings: How to Get By Without Even Trying

Sarah Cooper

Jan 2017 · Simon and Schuster · Narrated by Sarah Cooper

About this audiobook

You know those subtle tricks your coworkers are all guilty of? The constant nodding, pretend concentration, useless rhetorical questions? These tricks make them seem like they know what they’re doing when in fact they have no clue. This behavior is so ingrained, so subtle, and so often mistaken for true intelligence that identifying it, calling it out, or compiling it into an exhaustive digest has never been attempted. Until now.

Complete with examples, and scenarios, 100 Tricks gives you actionable ways to use words like “actionable,” in order to sound smart. Every type of meeting is covered, from general meetings where you stopped paying attention almost immediately, to one-on-one meetings you zoned out on, to impromptu meetings you were painfully subjected to at the last minute. It’s all here.

Find an easy-to-digest trick guiding you on:

-How to nail the big meeting by pacing and nodding.

-Most effective ways to listen to your coworkers while still completely ignoring them.

-The key to making your presentations “interactive.”

If you hadn’t noticed these behaviors before, you will see them now—from your colleagues, your managers, and soon yourself. Each trick is a mirror to the reality of what happens in meetings, told in the form of hilariously bad advice—advice that you might just want to take. But probably not. But maybe.

Ratings and reviews

AAA

About the author

Sarah Cooper is a comedian, speaker, and author of bestselling books How to Be Successful Without Hurting Men’s Feelings and 100 Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings, both of which are in development as series for television, Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings Day-to-Day and Monthly Calendars.  Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings Monthly Planner. She built her comedy career in between working for companies like Yahoo! and Google, where she was fed free lunches and lots of material.

In April 2020, Sarah went viral with a video called “How to Medical,” in which she lip syncs Trump’s proposed COVID-19 cures of UV light and disinfectant, viewed over 25 million times across Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and Facebook. She has since created dozens more Trump lip-syncs each garnering millions of views. She was named one of Variety’s 10 Comics to Watch for 2020, was featured at this year’s Just for Laughs Festival and has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live, The Tonight Show, Ellen, and has been featured in Vanity Fair, The New York Times, Washington Post, InStyle Magazine and countless others.

Sarah’s first comedy special, Everything’s Fine, is streaming on Netflix.